Patient motion, including the gross translation and rotation and the cardiac pulsation, in the presence of strong diffusion-encoding gradients can cause a spatially non-linear phase distribution at the end of a diffusion-preparation period. This spatially non-linear phase distribution can affect image encoding and decoding, and can also interact with the radio frequency (RF) pulses to create artifacts.
Although methods are known for dealing with the effect of a spatially non-linear phase distribution on image encoding and decoding (e.g., by performing retrospective correction to the image after it is obtained), it is considerably more difficult to mitigate the effect of phase errors on the RF pulses. Accordingly it would be an advance in the art to provide improved real time correction of phase errors in MR imaging.